The Fourth Chair
“So we’re really going to talk about it today?”
“We don’t have to.”
“We always say that. And then it just sits there anyway.”
“Because every time we touch it, everything else falls apart.”
“That already happened.”
Silence.
“You remember the house?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t remember everything. Just pieces.”
“That’s enough.”
“I remember coming back from Georgia. He was mad. Real mad.”
“Don’t.”
“No, we’re here. We said we’d stop pretending.”
Silence again.
“He grabbed us. Hard. Like we did something wrong.”
“We didn’t.”
“I know that now. Didn’t know it then.”
“He was breathing all heavy. Hands everywhere. Slapping us like we were supposed to take it.”
“Stop.”
“He didn’t… you know. But it was close. Too close.”
“That still counts.”
“I know.”
Long pause.
“Why didn’t we tell anybody?”
“We tried.”
“Not really.”
“We knew how that was going to go. She already chose him once. We weren’t going to win that fight.”
“She was supposed to protect us.”
“She didn’t even protect herself.”
“That doesn’t make it hurt less.”
“I know.”
Silence.
“You know what the worst part was?”
“What?”
“School. People already calling us gay. Already laughing. Already watching how we walk, how we talk. And we’re carrying that in our head. No way we were going to tell anybody a grown man touched us.”
“They would’ve turned it into a joke.”
“Or said we wanted it.”
“Or said that’s why we act the way we do.”
“Exactly.”
Silence again.
“That’s where the anxiety started getting louder.”
“It was already there. Remember? Our father passed away.
“Yeah, but after that that happened, it never shut up.”
“And the depression?”
“That came when we realized nobody was coming to fix it.”
Long pause.
“You ever think about that chair?”
“Don’t start.”
“I’m serious. You ever notice how it’s always there, even when we’re not looking at it?”
“I hate that chair.”
“Yeah. But sometimes it feels like the only quiet place in the room.”
Silence.
“I’m glad it’s empty today.”
“Me too.”
“Because if somebody was sitting there…”
“…we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
No one speaks after that.
The fourth chair stays empty.
And for once,
that feels like a small victory.